Antibiotics: a precious resource - The Telegraph 9th January 2008

We humans have a wonderful ability to become complacent about even the most life-threatening of dangers; once we believe we have a reliable and easily accessible means to defend ourselves, then any risk becomes so much more relative. Even thirty years ago when I started out in general practice, the spectre of bacterial infections and the many life threatening diseases they wrought were the source of far more real fear than they are today partly because more people could remember what it was like not to have antibiotics. Despite the arrival of penicillin even the common-or-garden sore throat was perceived to be a real danger right up until the late 50s and early 60s. "Strep throat" could and often did lead to any number of nasty diseases; "rheumatic fever", for example which, if it didn't kill you, could leave the sufferer with life long heart problems and more.

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